I was 52 and starting to show signs of menopause- missed periods, hot flashes, extreme moodiness, etc. I didn’t have chemo but my resection seemed to affect my hormones in a weird way because all signs of menopause stopped, and I went back to having clockwork type periods for about 15 months. I aske...

I recommend Dr. Sadiq at UNC. A friend, who is a head of a department at UNC told me that Dr. Sadiq did the most difficult cases because he was very skilled. I have heard good things about Dr. Thacker at Duke also. I received superb care at UNC from my surgeon through PA to nurses and WOCN. Plus pri...

Surgical recovery was quick. 2 days in the hospital. Back to work within 2 weeks. Learning to live with my new anatomy is an ongoing but improving process. The first 6 months were tough. Good luck to your mom.

Same thing happened to me on the day before surgery. I called, and the response was that it was still ok and it happened to a lot of people. I vomited from about 2 pm on the day prior to surgery until they put me under.

Echo the suggestion for finding a board certified colorectal surgeon. Many of us have had tumors very close to the anal verge and have: had a laparoscopic procedure and avoided a colostomy. Colon cancer is generally very slow growing so you may want to search out a second opinion at a major cancer c...

Have a safe trip home. I forgot about the heparin shots. I only had them in the hospital. I do remember a nurse asking me if I "wanted" the shot so I asked the surgeon if they were optional. The surgeon said once I went home, I would be moving around so much that the threat of blood clots ...

You may have LARS (Low Anterior Resection Syndrome). Unfortunately for me, it seems to be an individual trial and error journey to find what foods are tolerable. Those tolerable foods seem to vary. I also feel as if my diet is more carb heavy since many vegetables and salad are on my "bad"...

So glad that everything went well with your mother. She sounds like a trooper, and you are a great caregiver! NHMike - To reaffirm another post, I did not find the pain level that bad after my ULAR and temp ileostomy. My surgery started at 8 AM on a Tuesday; in recovery at ~2PM; in a room at 5 PM; o...

Hi KathyLynn, I was a T2N0M0, 3 cm from the AV. No chemo/rad - just surgery. My surgeon did mention that if it had been T3N0M0, then he would have recommended chemo (no radiation) pre-surgery. His rationale was that he was trying to avoid a permanent colostomy since the tumor was so low and that rad...

Kathy, My tumor was really low, and I was pretty sure that I would need a permanent colostomy. However, my surgeon was very confident that I would only need a temporary ileostomy as long as there were no cancer cells in the sphincter muscles. There has been a lot of progress on "sphincter spari...

I had a similar diagnosis and treatment. I'm about 15 months out from reversal. I stuck to a low fiber, bland diet for a few weeks; and then started to gradually add in foods. My doctor said that it would be mostly a trial and error process. I have found that raw vegetables, fruit with skin, and sal...